Mistakes with Vodka and Blue Gatorade
by Treasurer
Summary: Jasper was either the life of the party or in the backseat. And we always seemed to be there at the same time." AU, AH. B/J B/E A/J. M for language, drinking/drug use, and sexual situations.


**To be honest, it didn't take a lot of creative writing to pump this out. If anything, it's really just an elaborated paper I had for my writing class. We had to write a personal narrative about a lesson learned and this just so happened to be one of them. So, realize that when you're reading this, it's all personal experience. I really felt the need to put this out there. Publicly proclaim that I have made a lot of mistakes in my short years and that I don't think I'm a horrible person for it. Also, don't take offense to the part on religion. I'm not saying that organized religion is bad. I'm a little hesitant on doing this, I'll probably need tons of support to stop me from deleting it.**

**As, always, Stephenie Meyer owns all the names and descriptions of the people I use...But never, ever the story.;]**

It all started with a goodbye: a goodbye to Edward, my boyfriend of fourteen months on a rainy November second.

In the beginning, we were quite the pair. We met by chance at a mutual friend's house. He was playing guitar when I walked into Emmett's room, his bronze hair falling all over the place in front of his eyes. I didn't want to ruin their jam session, because I was early anyways, so I just sat on the floor in front of them. I never really got into playing music or the mechanics of it, but I could tell he had talent.

And then he swayed his hair out of his eyes as he moved insatiably to the awesome riff he was creating. He bit his lip and opened his eyes. They were a piercing green, like emeralds. And he smirked when he noticed my gawking. That is when I knew that this boy in front of me was someone I would have to get to know. It turns out, we had met before and for some reason, I hadn't noticed his beauty until then.

I dropped an ashtray during a conversation we were having and the shards cut his leg, and I apologized like crazy. But, he just laughed and told me my number would suffice as an apology.

He was witty and outgoing, and that's what attracted me to him. We did everything together and made it fun, whether it was ducking for cover from Jessica Stanley outside the mall when she spotted us, or laying around on my futon and watching fat people lose weight or people who didn't know they were pregnant have babies. We went to our friend's shows to give support, and I gave him a lot of encouragement before his sets when it was his turn for the mic.

We walked to the beach and ate really expensive knock off blizzards just to say we didn't have anymore money when others asked us to go hang out with them. And when our friends, Angela and Ben, tricked us into hanging out with them, he would always end up making it a make out contest in the back of Ben's van. He was a sore loser, so I had to let him let us win.

But, then things started to change. He avoided all of our friends, even when he couldn't hang out with me because I was working. I didn't pay it much attention though. Because even though he started becoming a recluse, he was still the same funny ass boy I met when he was with me. Our moments still clung to us, and I was perfectly content.

Once, we almost got caught making love by his parents, but he snuck me out of the house, just before they could even see me. He laughed about it, saying it was hilarious. I completely disagreed.

This one time we sat in our favorite cafe for two hours just talking about how you could judge someone by their name. I'd give a name, he'd tell me their traits. The process would reverse and repeat itself until we couldn't even think of any other names.

I felt like I was on the inside of his circle then, the one he stayed locked up in and kept everyone else out of.

I was very needy and vulnerable at that point of our relationship, and I don't think he knew that. I hung onto every word he told me, and more importantly, every word he didn't. If he didn't come over when I thought he would, or didn't tell me just the right amount of times that he loved me, I'd mumble something about "eating glass" and he'd be over in a heart beat to lesson my fears. He called me a spoiled little girl, but always laughed as he said it. So, I saw no problem in my actions.

I stayed that way for awhile, but then things started to change again and I'm not quite sure when, I think it was around the time we had our first big argument. That I was too hard on him, and sometimes he felt obligated to see me. Before I had even recovered from that blow to my security, another fight erupted. He told me that sex had gotten boring and wasn't fun anymore. I screamed it was kind of hard to get creative when your boyfriend couldn't last longer than five minutes.

We made up, but I cried when he tried to kiss me and tell me he didn't mean that I was boring. Something about his lips on mine made me feel dirty and unwanted.

Things seemed to get better after that though, and after we saw Fleet Foxes and had amazing sex, I thought everything would be okay. And I took it to heart when he told me I made him feel like he always had to be there for me, so I started to hang out with all of my friends again. I didn't realize how much I had missed them until I started to be around them again. I didn't understand how I ever could have ignored them.

After hanging out with my friends, I also realized I had neglected my writings since we had started dating and I freaked out and stayed in my room, out of sight from everyone with pen scratching paper obsessively.

When Edward would ask if I wanted to hang out, I'd say no. Or, I'd leave him an hour earlier than planned just to get back to my friends of paper. I grew worried that because I wasn't ridiculously compelled to hear him say that he loved me or have him near me, that our love was fading.

Then, I thought it was okay, because I realized that my love for him was just maturing into something beyond infatuation and we would be fine.

But, this isn't where it ends, like I said this all just brings me to the beginning. Because, he changed again. And I felt like I was on the outside of that circle he had and that he was pushing me further and further away. I didn't do much about it though, I let it fall apart and I didn't know what to say to him anywhere, because I knew I probably wouldn't get a response out of him anyways.

I called him over and in tears, we laughed and cried, but most importantly, we broke up. I didn't know what a life with out him would feel like, and I was scared to face the unknown without his hand to guide me. The bruises left over from our broken relationship brought out the worst in me as I tried to find ways to cover them up.

On Halloween, I met Jasper. My friend, Alice, had brought him over but he stayed after she left. We talked for hours, until 7:30 in the morning. Our conversations were intense, and our eyes never strayed from the others. We finished a pack of cigarettes together and crushed a 12 pack of beer while spilling secrets we had never shared with anyone else. His ocean eyes bore through me, and I was absorbed in every word he said. He talked with his hands and when he couldn't believe what I was saying, he let out a nervous chuckle and put his hands over his face as if he were embarrassed. His dimples were deep and his shaggy blond hair splayed out over his hands every time he did it.

We ended up laying on the couch next to each other joking every music video that came on VH1, except for Lady Gaga, until I fell asleep with his arm around me. I had a small crush on him, but I didn't act on it. I was still dating Edward and above anything I just wanted Jasper as a friend.

After that night, we continued to talk on facebook and through text messaging. I broke up with Edward, and I continued to like Jasper. He seemed to always know the right things to say to me. We teased each other about everything the other had said, and decided that we had the Gaga Virus.

That was until I received a phone call from Alice. "Hey, remember Jasper? We're dating!" I told her congratulations and swallowed sadness, and this is where I made my first mistake.

I decided I wasn't going to stop talking to him just because my friend was dating him. I deluded myself into thinking I would be best friends with him and nothing else. Relentlessly, I called to hang out until finally he agreed to go to a show with me. We had a great time talking about anything from religion to books to music. We both agreed we didn't believe in organized religion, our favorite author was Kurt Vonnegut, but we couldn't quite agree on a band. I religiously vowed Conor Oberst, he proclaimed some guy I never had even heard of.

On the drive home, he asked if I believed that despondency was the only way to live. Blinded by my need to impress him, I said yes. He said that he had never felt more connected to the world than when he was drunk, talking to a forty year old crack head. I told him that the only way I could stay grounded is if my face kept planting itself on to the floor. After that, we agreed our main goal as friends was to get drunk together; to ruin our lives to feel what was real. If only I knew how faithfully we would stick to our vows.

We didn't talk much for a few days after that, but it was a comfortable distance. I truly felt that I had made a new friend in the week or so I had known him. I had never connected to someone so fast...not since Edward. But with Jasper, it was still so different. He didn't listen to the same music, he didn't have the same personality at all, didn't like the same things, didn't use the same words.

Jasper was either the life of the party or in the backseat. And we always seemed to be there at the same time.

I was supposed to spend the night at Alice's house the night it happened, but her parents changed their minds last minute and said that no one could stay over for the night. Instead, we had a movie night with a few other friends, and she asked me if I could pick up Jasper because we didn't live that far away from each other.

I carefully watched how Jasper and Alice acted around one another. They didn't sit on the same couch, and barely even flirted. Alice was too busy trying to make sure everyone at the party had every need met, asking me three times if I had the soda I wanted. I thought it was odd. But, then I saw them in the corner and the way he looked at her, they way she was blushing, it made my heart hurt.

We gathered around her tv and laughed and laughed and laughed through Shaun of the Dead. We talked about the gore and agreed that British humor was the best.

Afterward, we all went for a walk around Alice's neighborhood and our friend Jacob looked over towards me and Jasper and said, "I've got a bottle of vodka if you've got a place to drink it!" I called up my friend and conveniently placed neighbor, Lauren, and asked if she wanted to have a little get together.

Without knowing, I had set the stage for my disaster. An hour after the phone call, Jasper and I were on our way back to Lauren's to enjoy our lives as we destroyed them, to quote his diatribe on the way there. Alice told me to make sure that Jasper stayed out of trouble, and I told her he would be in great hands.

It started out a really great night; everyone was giggling about any word spoken, and I was talking far too loud. Jasper kept yelling at me to keep up with his shots. When I rebutted saying that his shots were more like full glasses, he called me a pussy and took another gulp. He said that in Texas, him and his friends would each get their own bottle of Jack and finish it off on their own at their parties. That us kids in the north didn't know how to handle their liquor. I quickly finished my drink to disprove his point, and poured another glass, this time mixing it with blue Gatorade.

I told him that I was going to take Spanish next semester, and he told me he'd be my tutor. That in Texas he had learned it from his Mexican nanny. He spoke fluently, and I asked him if I had to pay for his services. He said that I had to just be his friend. Soon after, Jasper and I held our hands together and raised them in the air screaming that we were going to be "best friends, no matter what!"

The turning point was when we went outside to get out of the makeshift dance party occurring in the house. I read him a poem I had written a few years back about destroying everything we created.

He told me in a hushed whisper that he wanted to kiss me. I told him to shut up and that he was just ridiculously drunk. But, he kept persisting to kiss me no matter how hard I resisted. I soon folded. How hard can it be for a guy to talk a girl into kissing him when she likes him? I knew it was wrong the entire time I kissed him; he was dating my best friend, for crying out loud.

Every time I got the chance to separate myself from his lips, I would ask him why he was kissing me. He told me he just really wanted me. I asked him if it changed his feelings for Alice, and he said no. Before I could react to his words, he'd suffocate me in another kiss.

Everyone in the house had left to their own, and we were left alone in the living room. I told him a few more times to stop, but at a certain point, it didn't matter anymore. Morals had been abandoned, and there were no angels on my shoulder rooting for me to make the right decision.

At a last attempt at jumping off the ship, I asked "What does this all mean?"

"What does it all mean?"

"Yeah."

With hooded eyes he jumped on top of me and kissed my neck, whispering, "I'll show you."

His lips danced around my face, neck, and collar bone in a frenzied rhythm, never quite able to stay at one place too long. "If you don't stop, I'm going to do things you don't want me to," I moaned the words, because he kept grinding himself into me.

"What makes you think I don't want you to?" Those words started Act Two.

I ripped his clothes off just as sloppily as he was kissing me and when we became one, it felt a little off, because he felt a lot different than Edward. But, soon I was forgetting all about Edward and a few times we fell off the couch.

We were too drunk to notice the bruises we were giving each other by slamming ourselves into nearing furniture, to drunk to notice the damage we were internally doing to ourselves as well. He said something in Spanish as he hovered over me, and I hesitated when he tried to take off my bra. He kept telling me he wanted to see all of me, that I was beautiful. And in my induced state, I allowed it.

I started to not enjoy it when his fingers touched my breasts. It didn't feel good anymore, it just felt disgusting. And then he looked me in the eyes, and I snapped.

Realization hit me hard.

The angels were back on my shoulder screaming at me to stop.

"Please, please just stop. I'm sorry, I can't do this anymore." He hesitated, but got off of me and then I ran to the bathroom to cry. I didn't cry because I was worried over being caught; I was crying because I couldn't believe I even did something so cruel. I had just betrayed the one girl that would do anything for me, my best friend.

He stumbled to the door and slurred an "Are you okay, Bella?" But, I just ignored him and when I got into bed and he hopped in too, I turned away from him, to afraid to see his face again. Thinking if I couldn't see him, it'd be as if it never happened.

Immediately out of guilt, I missed the comfort that was Edward. The guilt increased the next morning when he sent flowers for our would-be fifteenth month anniversary. I laughed when I saw them. Not because I thought he was foolish, but because I didn't deserve them. I didn't deserve him.

Jasper apparently hung out with Alice that next day, too, and realized how wrong he was in his actions. He called me, begging me not to tell Alice. Because, even though he had known her only for a week longer than me, he loved her. That what happened between us was a mistake and that he really needed her in his life.

I was pissed beyond belief in what he was asking of me. To lie to my best friend and pretend all was merry. How could he expect me not to cry when I saw her? How did he not? I told him that the only way I wouldn't tell her is if he broke it off with her.

He decided to take the chance and told her. She was heart broken, and later on she told me she cried for 20 hours straight. The next day I went over to Alice's house, and we cried in each others arms comforting each other. The first words she had told me were that she forgave me and that she still loved me. I was just surprised that she had forgiven me so fast; I was surprised that she was actually telling me to stop crying as if I didn't deserve to.

I begged for her to hit me, to tell me I was a horrible person. She cried even harder asking why couldn't she just have one boyfriend that didn't cheat on her and that she said she couldn't hate me, that even though she was mad at me, that she loved me more than any other emotion she could conjure up.

Jasper called me when I got home from seeing her, telling me that he just wanted me to know that he thought I was a valuable person, and that he was sorry he had taken advantage of me liking him. That he didn't mean to play me, that vodka and him apparently didn't mix anymore. Trying to make light of the situation, I asked him what happened to the liquor drinking Texan. He responded with an "I'm sorry for ruining our chance at being friends."

We haven't talked since.

In all my short days, I had never done something to someone so outrageous and horrifying. I've always been the type of person who tries to be the peace keeper; I'm the person other people come to when they have problems. The vulnerability of the left over bruises took that away from me, and I realized that all people are fragile, that even the men with the biggest hearts get lost and caught up in their greed. I know that I will never do anything like I did that night ever again, I'm a person that tends to learn the first time.

But some days, I really miss Jasper, the relationship we had that came easy as breathing. And, it sucks, because...we ruined it. Turned it into a patient with lung cancer, it died. Sometimes, I wonder what would have happened if I had just been able to spend the night with Alice that night. Would we have ever hooked up? Would we still be best friends, would we have become something more if he and Alice broke up?

Jasper and Alice worked out their problems, and last I heard, still together. Alice and I hang out still, but no where near the same amount as in the past. And I always keep my distance if I know she's with Jasper. Jasper found a new person to get drunk and ruin his life with, his girlfriend. I guess if they have sex, it won't really cause drama. Ha.

As for me, Edward and I are talking again. Even though it's not quite the same as it used to be, we're doing good. And I'm glad I have him back in my life. Today is our seventeen month anniversary and he bought me panera and the ring I've been wanting for a year. He's trying really hard for us to be us again, and so am I.

The simple action of breaking up with Edward led me to pursue a forbidden fruit, eat it, spit it out, and realize that it wasn't what I wanted in the first place. There really is a reason it's forbidden: it's a putrid, rotten fruit that just isn't worth anyone's time. Like with the story of Eve and the tree, I learned just how temptation affects you when you've been broken down, and I will never judge another for their mistakes.


End file.
